One of the key skills to consistently catching, is “control of your equipment!” The effect is so great, it accounts for 30% of your fishing success. So why wouldn’t you want to hone it?
Control is just as important in executing any fly fishing technique as it is in the act of casting a fly line. Below are some examples of practically improving and associated benefits: –
Combining some Stillwater fly fishing outside the river trout season with home based casting practice drills. This process performed correctly will increase your overall casting distance through increasing control of your technique. This is a great achievement on its own. However, it’s also off season over-distance training for the river trout season to come. Your average casting distance on a stillwater is longer than that on a river. So having increased your casting comfort zone (the distances at which you can consistently make high quality presentations of your fly/flies), switching to the river is effectively tapering back to “race distance”. Net result, increased control, accuracy and consistency. Bingo!
Anglers planning a destination trip can find huge benefits in the above casting schedule too. Not just for river fishing either. For consistent success in saltwater fly fishing, many of the key skills required are those needed in various stillwater fly fishing situations. In addition to the casting example above, we can add fishing technique specific examples, such as maintaining tension through the line, hook setting, fish spotting, among others.
River fishing during winter for grayling, chub and pike enables you to practice technique specific skills, particularly nymph and streamer fishing techniques. For example, Euro nymphing methods are highly productive in catching winter grayling. Retaining contact with your fly(flies) is key to maximising takes and take detection (it’s pointless to deceive a fish, if you don’t know about it). Nymph fishing is often the mainstay of early spring success with river trout, when air and water temperatures can be low. So you hit the ground running!
Need some motivation to get you started? Remember the last time you tried to cast that heavy fly only to end up wearing it? Ouch! What about an outing when you knew fish were in front of you and feeding subsurface though you never had a bite? Well maybe you didn’t, however it’s probable you did and failed to detect the take.
Checkout this post and video on practice to help you get started. If you would like help moving forward, take a look at my services here.
Have Fun!
SJY